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Watchwords

'Castaway Island Home' from the Castaway series by Cindy Wider. 'Imagine living a castaway lifestyle by choice...on an island, living in a home of simple pleasures surrounded by gorgeous tropical flora and fauna.' (Digital Painting) Artwork courtesy of Cindy Wider.

Artist Watch

The Artist

Cindy Wider (continued)

‘I
see it as an honour for artwork to be accepted into the art licensing section. It means that masses of people will experience and (hopefully) fall in love with the images.'

For those people who need to know, how can they access and purchase your paintings and does your work hold its value in a ferociously competitive market?

‘All my original paintings have a certificate of authenticity with them. My newly created original paintings can’t be sold under $6,600. That’s the valuation my rep in Los Angeles has put on them –
based upon my resume and sales success in Australia.

‘I sometimes produce an image from a digital artwork that I have created from my imagination using Adobe Illustrator. Then I send the image off to my agent in
Florida (for art licensing onto products). If someone wants to buy the image for art licensing they buy the digital image and sign an agreement to do that. The image remains mine by copyright law. So I always retain the copyright.

‘Where it says on my website “available from Cindy” it means the digital art image is available for commission. That means that I will paint a one-off original
artwork in acrylic on paper or canvas to the size that the client would like and there will be only one original image painted in acrylic from this digital image.

‘If
a client would like to purchase the image as an original acrylic painting then they tell me (pay a deposit of 50% of the price of the painting) and I paint it for them as near to the digital artwork give or take creative expression. Then I take a photograph
of the painting, ask the client if they are happy with it, they pay me the balance, then I ship it to them wherever they are.’

Art Licensing
is something that Cindy is passionate about. It took her 23 years to decide if she wanted to go into that area and only decided to put her work up for licensing because she was accepted to do so by one of the best companies in America.

‘My agent Lance Klass of Porterfields Fine Art is one of the best and most highly respected in the industry. He receives thousands of applications from artists to be represented
each year and I was one of the lucky 36 artists that he has chosen to represent. Lance looks after the deals that come my way and will make sure that only the highest quality opportunities are accepted.

‘I see it as an honour for artwork to be accepted into the art licensing sector. It means that masses of people will experience and (hopefully) fall in love with the images.’

Cindy says that understanding copyright is enormously important to all artists.

‘The
copyright to the artwork always remains the artist's unless otherwise stated in writing and the artist paid a massive sum for that image. I never sell copyright to my works. When my agent licenses the image he will have a contract in place for x number of
years.

‘The contract is sometimes exclusive (for the one image so that no one else can use the image on other products) or sometimes not. For exclusivity
the company must pay a lot more money for the image. The copyright to an artwork could cost a person many tens of thousands of dollars. Unfortunately, many artists have their work blatantly copied and it’s just not acceptable.

‘The idea for 'Moonlight Cat' for example [see image top right at the ‘What’s on Authors’ tab on the menu at left] was not an easy or quick thought. It required first of
all the idea, then so much careful consideration of many art skills; composition, light and shade balance, hue considerations for mood, action lines, the study of the convex and concave curve – blah, blah, blah!...you all know the story of what has to
be done...all the creative decisions that have to be made to make it a successful image.

‘The original is valuable and becomes more valuable if it
gets accepted into licensing. It's an extremely competitive field and only the best of the best get in. Consider the great artists who put their work into print and products and how much the original improved in value. The exposure of the image in such a way
adds to the ‘fame’ of the original.

‘Think about how valuable the original artwork is for licensed artists
such as Mary Engelbreit, Ken Done, Thomas Kinkade and so many others. The most obvious evidence for this is how the value of an original significantly increases as a limited edition of prints sells out.

‘I am still with one Australian Gallery, The Kerrmuller Collection at No: 10 in Nambour on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland. It’s a beautiful ‘real’ gallery that people
can visit, not just internet based. The owners Ian and Meryll Muller are dealers and they actually own some of my pieces, but they are selling their gallery so I am looking for a new gallery in Brisbane for representation.

‘There are also works of mine listed on the Kerrmuller eBay site for sale at my old prices [see ‘Yesterday Today and Tomorrow’ from the Fire
Paintings series at top right of the Competitions page: Theatre/Film/TV]. As I said, you can't buy a new piece from me under $6,600 now because that is the valuation since I recently signed on with my new agent in Los Angeles.’

‘I often get enquiries about prints but I don't want to get involved in the process myself – too busy with other projects on the go. Porterfields Fine Art is my current agent for art licensing. They are very much
current and active. Lance Klass (the owner) finds contracts for my work to be licensed to big companies and corporations.

‘I am actually looking for
businesses in Australia who are interested in licensing my artwork onto products and prints – then at last it can be available to the Australian Audience.

‘The
artworks listed on porterfieldsfineart.com are all available for licensing onto products and it would be great if a company chose to put my works into print...they are all available and ready to
print. They are especially created as digital artworks (in vector) so that they can be printed as huge or small as the company requires. Pretty exciting.’

'Castaway in Paradise' from the Castaway series by Cindy Wider. 'Imagine living a castaway lifestyle on a tropical Island. A little boat brings some basic supplies every couple of weeks. Its a blissful life, a life that you choose to live.' (Digital painting) Artwork courtesy of Cindy Wider.